


Three Weeks

by alenie



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, M/M, Wolf Derek, ghost!stiles
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-12
Updated: 2013-01-12
Packaged: 2017-11-25 04:40:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 766
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/635217
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alenie/pseuds/alenie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Stiles died in late January.</p><p>For three weeks after, Derek didn't shift.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Three Weeks

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by [this artwork](http://ninakask.tumblr.com/post/40103943525) by Ninakask.

Stiles died in late January.

For three weeks after, Derek didn’t shift.

There wasn’t much he did do, during that long, dark month. He visited Stiles’ grave weekly. On Wednesdays, because Stiles died on a Wednesday. Sometimes he left flowers there, on top of the still-healing earth. Sometimes there were already flowers, because Stiles’ dad liked to bring Stiles flowers too.

He worked out compulsively, hours and hours each day, but despite the exercise he still spent long nights lying awake, thinking of all the ways he could have saved Stiles, if only he’d been stronger, faster, braver, _better_. He had next to no appetite, but Isaac came over almost daily, bringing tupperwares full of food and refusing to leave until Derek ate something.

Derek just wanted to be left alone.

In the middle of February, there was a freak blizzard. Derek spent days cooped up in house, penned in by the below-freezing temperatures and heavy snow, until he couldn’t take it anymore. He stripped just inside the front door, stepped out, and shifted. As a wolf, his fur was thick and brown, and kept him insulated from the cold. He nudged the door shut with his muzzle, and bounded out into the snow.

He ran for an hour, and when he got tired, he bit at the snow and chewed on it until he felt refreshed and ready to go back home. He was nearing his house when he spotted something pale and out of place up ahead, amongst the trees. There was something familiar about its form that had Derek whining uneasily and side-stepping through the snow, because it looked like Stiles, and it couldn’t be Stiles, because Stiles was _dead_. He’d been dead when Derek found him, dead when the paramedics examined him, and dead when Derek watched as his coffin was lowered into the ground.

Derek howled a long, mournful howl and the figure spun around and _it was Stiles_. Nearly translucent, fading out of sight against the snow, but Stiles.

Stiles took a step forward and Derek nervously held his ground, whined again.

“Derek. Hey,” Stiles said. “Don’t freak out, okay?”

But _how_ , Derek tried to say. Instead, he yipped. Frustrated, he shifted back to human form, only to look up and find that Stiles had disappeared. He spun in a circle, didn’t see Stiles anywhere, panicked, and instinctively shifted back to wolf.

Stiles was standing only a few steps away, wearing only jeans and a t-shirt, barefoot in the snow. Derek padded up to him cautiously and pushed his muzzle into Stiles’ palm. It felt real enough, solid and warm, but he could see right through it.

“I know, it’s weird, right?” Stiles said. “I tested it out, and only animals can see me. God, I’m glad you finally shifted again. I was beginning to think you never would.”

Derek yipped again.

“Yeah, I could have gone to see Scott, I guess, but I…I don’t know. I couldn’t bring myself to try.”

Stiles sighed.

“Stay like this for a while? I know it probably sucks for you with the whole no-talking thing, but just bear with me, okay?”

Derek licked his hand.

“Thanks, dude.”

Stiles didn’t taste like he was supposed to. Derek scented him, and he didn’t smell right, either. He didn’t smell like anything,and it was weird and wrong, and Derek lifted his head and nosed at Stiles’ side, where one of the bullets had gone in, and let out a low, unhappy moan.

“Hey, no. Stop that.” Stiles dropped to his knees in the snow and grabbed Derek’s face in both hands. “Derek. It wasn’t your fault. If you could have saved me, you would have. Don’t think for a second I don’t know that.”

He stared Derek down until Derek lowered his head in acceptance, and then suddenly he had both arms around Derek’s neck and his face was buried in Derek’s fur.

“I don’t know what’s going on,” Stiles mumbled. “I don’t know why I’m still here, why I’m like this. I don’t think I’m supposed to be. It doesn’t feel right.”

Stiles pressed in even closer, clinging to Derek.

“I went to see my dad. I know I shouldn’t have done it, but he’s my dad, you know? And he’s-he’s not doing so well. Look after him for me, okay?”

Derek curled his body around Stiles, and they sat together in the grove as Stiles cried cold damp tears into his fur and the blizzard let up and the clouds broke apart and the moon rose low and bright along the horizon.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Crossposted on my [tumblr](http://alenie.tumblr.com/post/40312168066).


End file.
